Prof Richard Griffiths (DICE/School of Anthropology & Conservation) helps review the success of mitigation driven animal translocations around the world.
For many years the use of animal translocations (involving the capture, transport and release or introduction of species from one location to another) as a means to mitigate construction projects and other human developments has been a widespread animal management tool. However, the success rates of these moves from a conservation standpoint – most are economically motivated – has remained unclear until now.
Collaborating with conservationists from San Diego Zoo Global, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service , Australia’s University of Newcastle , and Amphibian and Reptile Conservation in the UK, Professor Griffiths analysed a number of moves from a species conservation standpoint.
In conclusion, the team announced that although millions of dollars are spent annually on moving animals out of the way of human interference, such moves may not be meeting the goal of preserving the populations or decline of protected species as intended by legislation.
An additional challenge, pointed out in their paper Mitigation-driven translocations: are we moving wildlife in the right direction?, is the lack of information accompanying many of these translocations.
However, by observing and learning from carefully designed conservation driven translocation research over recent years, mitigation translocations can be improved to give protected species a better chance at long-term survival.
Professor Griffiths and colleagues at DICE have been working on this controversial topic for a number of years. The aforementioned collaboration was the result of them raising the issue with colleagues in other countries during the World Congress of Herpetology in Vancouver in 2012.
The study, available online ahead of print and scheduled for the March issue of Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment, can be viewed here .
Report by Gary Hughes